Irish republicanism

Irish Republicanism is the nationalist belief that all of Ireland should be a united independent republic.

Between 1169 and 1603 parts of Ireland were ruled by Hiberno-Norman lords or directly from England; after 1603 all Ireland came firmly under English rule as a colony. In 1801, it became part of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. The development of nationalist and democratic sentiment throughout Europe was reflected in Ireland in the emergence of republicanism. Discrimination against Roman Catholics and a feeling that Ireland was economically disadvantaged in the United Kingdom were among the specific factors leading to opposition to British rule.

In Irish history and politics, it is common to draw a distinction between nationalism and republicanism. The term nationalism is used for any manifestation of national sentiment, including cultural manifestations; for movements demanding autonomy from Britain but not complete independence; and sometimes for secessionist movements committed to constitutional methods. The term republicanism denotes movements demanding complete independence under a republican government. It is frequently associated with a willingness to use force to achieve political goals, and often, but not always, with a secular or non-sectarian outlook, whereas Irish nationalism almost always had a strong Catholic tinge.

History

Irish Republicanism in independent Ireland (the Irish Free State and the Republic of Ireland)

The Irish Free State

Though many across the country were unhappy with the Anglo-Irish Treaty (since, during the Anglo-Irish war, the IRA had fought for independence for all Ireland and for a republic, not a partitioned dominion under the British crown), most republicans were satisfied that the Treaty was the best that could be achieved at the time. However, a substantial minority opposed it. Dáil Éireann, the revolutionary Irish parliament, voted by 64 votes to 57 to ratify it, the majority believing that the treaty created a new base from which to move forward. Éamon de Valera, who had served as President of the Irish Republic during the war, refused to accept the decision of the Dáil and led the opponents of the treaty out of the House. The IRA itself split between pro-Treaty and anti-Treaty elements, with the former forming the nucleus of the new National Army.

Michael Collins became Commander-in-Chief of the National Army. Shortly afterwards, some dissidents, apparently without the authorisation of the anti-Treaty IRA Army Executive, occupied the Four Courts in Dublin and kidnapped a pro-Treaty general. The government, responding to this provocation and to intensified British pressure following the assassination by an IRA unit in London of Sir Henry Wilson, ordered the regular army to take the Four Courts, thereby beginning the Irish Civil War.

It is believed that Collins continued to fund and supply the IRA in Northern Ireland throughout the civil war but, after his death, W.T. Cosgrave (the new President of the Executive Council) discontinued this support.

By May 1923, the war (which had claimed more lives than the War of Independence) had ended in the defeat of the Irregulars. However, the harsh measures adopted by both sides, including assassinations of politicians by the Republicans and executions and atrocities by the Free State side, left a bitter legacy in Irish politics for decades to come.

De Valera, who had strongly supported the Republican side in the Civil War, reconsidered his views while in jail, and came to accept the ideas of political activity under the terms of the Free State constitution. However, he and his supporters failed to convince a majority of the anti-treaty Sinn Féin of these views and the movement split again. In 1926, he formed a new party called Fianna Fáil (Soldiers of Destiny). In 1932 he was elected President of the Executive Council of the Free State and began a slow process of turning the country from a constitutional monarchy to a constitutional republic, thus fulfilling Collins' prediction of "the freedom to achieve freedom".

By then, the IRA was engaged in confrontations with the Blueshirts, a quasi-fascist group led by a former War of Independence and pro-Treaty leader, General Eoin O'Duffy. O'Duffy looked to Fascist Italy as an example for Ireland to follow. Several hundred supporters of O'Duffy briefly went to Spain to volunteer on the Nationalist side in the Spanish Civil War, and a smaller number of IRA members, communists and others participated on the Republican side.

In 1937 the Constitution of Ireland was written by the De Valera government; the Constitution claimed jurisdiction over the whole of Ireland and, with an elected Irish President, diminished the role of the King as Ireland's head of state to the purely ceremonial. Although de Valera claimed Ireland was a republic in every way except in name, legally the country was still a British "dominion" like Canada, Australia, New Zealand, or South Africa. Furthermore, the claim to the whole of the island did not reflect practical reality and probably further entrenched Unionist opposition. Despite the successive splits of 1922 and 1926, the remainder of the IRA rejected all compromise with political realities and continued to consider themselves to be original and sole Republican Movement.

Republic of Ireland

Ireland finally became a republic in 1948 when the Republic of Ireland Act was passed. This finally severed constitutional connection with Britain or The Commonwealth. In 1955 the Republic joined the United Nations and in 1973 joined the European Economic Community (now the European Union) in a move designed to bring Ireland closer to other European nations and to reduce the extent of its economic ties with Britain.

Nowadays there is little more than "tabloid newspaper" interest in the British monarchy in the Republic of Ireland, though there are a handful of Irish monarchists who have argued for replacing the republic with one of the original Irish royal families (the O'Neills, O'Connors or O'Briens). Today all the dominant political parties in the Republic of Ireland support the state's republican constitution.

Republican political parties in Ireland

Parties in favour of the Good Friday Agreement

Sinn Féin is Northern Ireland's biggest republican party and the fastest growing party in all of Ireland. It represents a mixture of progressive, socialist and conservative political views. It is led by Gerry Adams, and organises in both the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland. Previously known as Provisional Sinn Fein, the current organisation has its origins in the 1970 split between that group and Official Sinn Fein. In 1986 it reversed its original policy of not taking seats in Dáil Éireann. By the late 1990s it had replaced the SDLP as Northern Ireland's largest nationalist party. It currently holds a small number of seats in the British parliament, a modest number in the Dáil, and a large number in Northern Ireland's provincial assembly. Sinn Féin members elected to the British parliament refuse to take part in debates or votes, as they would have to take an oath of loyalty to the British monarch to do so.

Workers' Party of Ireland - After the IRA split in 1970 between the Provisional IRA and the Official IRA, Sinn Féin split as well between those who supported the leadership's Marxist line and more traditional republicans who supported Seán Mac Stiofáin and the Provisional IRA. In 1972 after a two-year armed campaign, the Official IRA called a ceasefire. Official Sinn Fein , in 1977, changed its name to Sinn Féin - The Workers' Party and in 1982 to simply The Workers Party. The Workers Party engaged in a Marxist-Leninist platform stressing "class politics", hoping to attract working-class Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland away from sectarian politics. However their efforts yielded little electoral success in Northern Ireland, where the party has performed very poorly at the polls.

Parties opposed to the Good Friday Agreement

Republican Sinn Féin Does not take part in parliamentary elections in either the Republic of Ireland or Northern Ireland because it views both as illegitimate. It is linked to the Continuity IRA, whose goals are the overthrow of British rule in Northern Ireland and the reunification of the country. They are led by former Sinn Fein leader Ruairí Ó Brádaigh who led radicals in a break with Sinn Féin in 1986 to create the party.

Irish Republican Socialist Party The IRSP was founded by Seamus Costello in 1974, who possibly had an eye towards James Connolly's Irish Socialist Republican Party of the late 19th/early 20th century when coining the party's name. Costello led other former Official IRA members dissatisfied with Goulding's policies and tactics.
The party quickly organized a paramilitary wing called the Irish National Liberation Army (INLA) which is still operating today, though on a "no first strike" ceasefire. It claims to follow the principles of republican socialism as set out by the 1916 rebellion leader James Connolly and radical 20th-century trade unionist James Larkin.

Republican political parties unique to the Republic of Ireland

Fianna Fáil - Translation: Soldiers of Destiny. A socially conservative, economically centrist party, it is Ireland's largest party and is currently the main partner in the Republic's coalition government. Its origins are in the 1926 split of the anti-treaty fraction of the original Sinn Féin.

Fine Gael - Translation: tribe of Irishmen. Currently the second largest party in Ireland, created by a merger of Cumann na nGaedheal with other pro-Treaty groups in 1933. Its origins are in the pro-Treaty fraction of the original Sinn Féin. In Government in 1948, it enacted the Republic of Ireland Act, that finally removed the state from UK Dominion and from the Commonwealth.

Republican political parties unique to Northern Ireland

SDLP - Irish Social Democratic and Labour Party. Formed in the 1960s, it associated itself entirely with the Civil Rights movement and was strongly opposed to the tactics of the IRA even in response to loyalist paramilitary and British army actions. The party is today led by Mark Durkan and is linked to other social-democratic parties (like those in the Republic of Ireland, Sweden, France, and Germany). The SDLP, unlike Sinn Féin, does not organise in the Republic of Ireland, but is strongly allied to the Irish Labour Party.

Republicanism in Northern Ireland

1921 - 1966

In 1921, Ireland was partitioned. Most of the country became part of the independent Irish Free State. However, six out of the nine counties of Ulster, encompassing four counties with safe Unionist majorities and two with small Unionist majorities, remained part of the United Kingdom. This territory of Northern Ireland, as established by the Government of Ireland Act 1920, had its own provincial government which was controlled for 50 years until 1972 by the conservative Ulster Unionist Party (UUP). The tendency to vote on sectarian lines and the proportions of each religious denomination ensured that there would never be a change of government. In local government, constituency boundaries were drawn to divide nationalist communities into two or even three constituencies and so weaken their effect (see Gerrymandering).

The Catholic population in Northern Ireland, besides feeling politically alienated, was also economically alienated, often with worse living standards compared to their Protestant neighbours, with fewer job opportunities and living in ghettos in Belfast, Derry, Armagh and other places. Most Catholics considered the Unionist government was undemocratic, bigoted and favoured Protestants. Emigration for economic reasons kept the nationalist population from growing, despite its higher birth rate.

During the 1930s the IRA launched minor attacks against the Unionist Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) and British army in Northern Ireland. The IRA began another armed campaign against Britain in 1939. During World War II the IRA leadership hoped for support from Germany, and chief of staff Seán Russell travelled there in 1940; he died later that year after falling ill on a U-boat that was bringing him back to Ireland. Suspected republicans were interned on both sides of the border, for different reasons.

The Border Campaign in the mid-50s was the last attempt at traditional military action and was an abject failure. The Movement needed to reconsider its strategy.

1966 - 1969

In the late 1960's, Irish political activists groups found parallels with their struggle against religious discrimination in the civil rights campaign of Afro-Americans the U.S. against racial discrimination. Student leaders such a Bernadette Devlin and Nationalist politicians such as Austin Currie tried to use non-violent direct action to draw attention to the blatant discrimination. By 1968, Europe as a whole was engulfed in a struggle between radicalism and coservativism. In Sinn Féin, the same debate raged. The dominant analysis was that Protestant Irishmen and women would never be bombed into a united Ireland. The only way forward was to have both sides embrace socialism and forget their sectarian hatreds. They resolved to no longer to be drawn into inter-communal violence.

As a response to the civil rights campaign militant loyalist paramilitary groups started to emerge in the Protestant community. The Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) was the first. The UVF had originally existed among loyalist Ulster Protestants before World War I to oppose Home Rule, but was absorbed into the Ulster Special Constabulary after 1921. In the 1960's it was relaunched by militant loyalists, encouraged by certain politicians, to oppose any attempt to reunite Northern Ireland with the Republic of Ireland, which is how they saw any change in their status vis-a-vis Catholics.

By mid 1969 the violence in Northern Ireland exploded. Consistent with their new political ideology, the IRA declined to intervene. By late August, the British government had to intervene and declare a state of emergency, sending a large number of troops into Northern Ireland to stop the intercommunal violence. This made British forces at first popular with Catholic residents. However, the British Army's mandate was to "aid the civil power": they appeared to have little concept of how one-sided that civil power was, or how unlike the (say) Surrey Constabulary was the Royal Ulster Constabulary.

1970 - 1985

Divisions began to emerge in the Republican movement between leftists and conservatives. The leader of the IRA, Cathal Goulding believed that the IRA could not beat the British with military tactics and should turn into a workers' revolutionary movement that would overthrow both governments to achieve a 32-county socialist republic through the will of the people (after WWII the IRA no longer engaged in any actions against the Republic). Goulding also drove the IRA into an ideologically Marxist-Leninist direction which attracted idealistic young supporters in the Republic, but alienated and angered many of the IRA's core supporters in the North. In particular, his decision to regard the UVF as deluded rather than as the enemy, was anathema to traditionalists and those who were its potential victims.

The argument led to a split in 1970, between the Official IRA (supporters of Goulding's Marxist line) and the Provisional IRA (also called Provos, traditional nationalist republicans). The Provos were led by Seán Mac Stiofáin and immediately began a large scale campaign against the unionist paramilitaries and British forces in Northern Ireland, while the Official IRA also initially maintained an armed campaign. In 1972, the Official IRA declared a cease-fire, which, apart from feuds with other republican groups, has been maintained to date. Nowadays the term 'Irish Republican Army' almost always denotes the Provisional IRA.

Throughout the 1970s and 1980s the conflict continued claiming thousands of lives, with the UVF (and other loyalist groups) extending attacks into the Republic of Ireland and the IRA launching attacks on targets in England. However some things slowly began to change. In the 1980's Provisional Sinn Féin (the Provisional IRA's political wing) began contesting elections and by the mid 1990's was representing the republican position at peace negotiations. In the loyalist movement splits occurred, the Ulster Unionist Party made tentative attempts to reform itself and attract Catholics into supporting the union with Britain, while the radical Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) led by Rev. Ian Paisley began attracting working class Protestant loyalists who felt alienated by the UUP's overtures towards Catholics.

1986 - 2005

At the 1986 Sinn Féin Ard Fheis, a motion declaring the end of the policy of abstentionism (refusing to take seats in the Republic of Ireland's parliament), was passed. This motion caused a split in the movement creating Republican Sinn Fein, a party committed to the 1970s Provisional Sinn Fein vision of a federal republic. It was led by former Sinn Féin President Ruairí Ó Brádaigh (who had previously led Provisional Sinn Féin to split from the Officials). The policy of participation in Dáil elections became known as "the Armalite and the ballot box".

In 1994 the leaders of Northern Ireland's two largest nationalist parties, Gerry Adams, the leader of Sinn Féin and John Hume, the leader of the SDLP (Irish Social-Democratic Labour Party) entered into peace negotiations with Unionist leaders like David Trimble of the UUP and the British government. At the table most of the paramilitary groups (including the IRA and UVF) had representatives. In 1998 when the IRA endorsed the Good Friday Agreement between nationalist and unionist parties and both governments, another small group split from the Provisional IRA to form the Real IRA (RIRA). The Continuity and Real IRA have both engaged in attacks not only against the British and loyalists, but even against their fellow nationalists (members of Sinn Féin, the SDLP and IRA).

Since 1998, the IRA and UVF have adhered to a ceasefire. However on the loyalist side the UDA and radical splinter groups that left the UVF after it endorsed the Good Friday Agreement (like the Ulster Loyalist Front - ULF) have continued attacking Catholics and each other.

Today the republican movement can be divided into moderates who wish to reunite with the Republic through peaceful means and radicals who wish to continue an armed campaign.

In late July 2005, the Provisional IRA announced that the war was over and that their weapons were to be put out of use.